I’m all for technology.  Really, I am.  I have a Facebook, a Twitter, a blog, and three e-mail addresses.  I’m rarely without my phone.  Still, like many people, I think there’s a point when people get too excited about technology, and they need to step back and consider whether it’s really making their lives easier.

Case in point:  A few weeks ago I had to do a “multimedia project” for my Spanish class.  The project basically consisted of talking in Spanish for four minutes, and accompanying the narration with a photo slideshow.  Okay, I get that our teacher wants us to learn to actually speak in Spanish.  That’s understandable.  But how does putting together a slideshow help me learn Spanish?  That’s right.  It doesn’t.  I learned to put together a slideshow in fourth grade.  If my teacher wanted to grade us on our speaking, he could have either had us just record audio without the pictures (which would still require technology, but would be a more sensible use of it), or he could have just had us talk and listened.

To complicate things further, we were required to use a program called Photostory to put together said slideshow.  Photostory is a Windows program; there is no Mac version.  So, basically, unless you happen to own a Windows laptop with an attached microphone, you had to use one of the 15 computers in the language lab in the Arts and Science building to complete the project.  Once again, how does using a certain slideshow program help me learn Spanish?  I could have done it just as easily using iMovie or some other program that’s already on my computer and much easier to use.

After I made my four-minute slideshow, I tried to upload it to Blackboard like my teacher instructed.  Guess what?  The file was too big.  So then I spent *another* 20 minutes doing some creative editing so the file would fit. Needless to say, I was more than a little annoyed with the Spanish 1200 coordinator and her pointless endorsement of technology by the time I finally got all that crap turned in.

Moral of the story?  When homework was on paper, there was one excuse:

The dog ate it.

When homework is digital, the excuses are infinite–not to mention a lot more legitimate:

The printer was out of ink/out of paper/disconnected.

The file was too big to post online/e-mail/save on a flash drive.

The computer crashed right before I clicked “save.”

The file was saved in a format this computer can’t read.

This computer doesn’t support that program.

THIS COMPUTER SIMPLY DOES NOT WORK.

Technology has bugs.  Paper, well, doesn’t.  I’m not saying technology doesn’t have its uses in education, because it certainly does.  But teachers and people who plan classes should think twice about whether whatever pretty new program they have will actually help students learn, or just add an unnecessary amount of stress and headaches.

As you all may know, we have moved to Blackboard 8 at the College of Pharmacy and there are a few key points to be aware of:

• URL – http://elearning.uams.edu
• Password – UAMS network log in and password
• To request a course contact Martha Carle or Victoria Miller (contact information located on Contact Me page)
• All electronic exams will be given through Blackboard.
• The Blackboard 8 gradebook is much more functional then the older version of WebCT and we will be using it to portray all of the student’s grades.

Well it’s back to being a busy bustling Librarian after a very tiring 3 day weekend thanks to a ‘training day’ last friday. Managed to become a fool in that time as I went home without packing pyjama’s and went to Scarborough shopping and somehow managed to forget my purse. Thankfully Mum was happy to bail me out over 2 presents. I’ll pay her back when she comes Christmas shopping my end this saturday. Hopefully with my new comfy desk chair which has evaded me again this past weekend.

I’m please to say I am making some improvements to the Library that my boss Terry is quite pleased with. Made some funky signs for the Fiction and Manga section as they didn’t really have any. Created and put into action some ‘Brand New to Catalogue’ signs and labels on books that we put on shelves showing off new books.  Also initiated a ‘New to Library’ list that promotes a selection of books recently put on catalogue in a range of subjects and some ficiton and manga. These lists are put on tables, in Blackboard announcements and on our Library Blog (which hasn’t had student input yet but I am mentioning it to a few now.) Got the Library on Twitter @HuddnewcollLib and also begun developing our use of Delicious.com bookmarking site. Found some rather interesting sites I might just look into myself.

I’m hoping today is going to be a lot easier and possibly quieter than last Thursday which was the first real nightmatre I’ve had since working here. It was a day of endless rule breakers, trouble makers and micky takers in our students. Had to take a few names down and threaten them with banishment due to their misbehaviour and inept ability not to learn their lesson in discipline.

On a more happy and creative note after visiting the sweetest shop of handmade gifts ever in Scarborough and purchasing two lovely handmade note books for some old friends I’ve come away with inspiration on how to make a further addition to their gifts. It involves card, fabric, picture maker paste, a good photograph, thread, beads, glitter, fabric paint and any other embellishments I come across hehehe. I can’t wait to start making them!

Further encouraged when one of my friendlier and in fact friendliest students by the name of Samantha (who is in to modern vampire novels) who says she makes all her christmas cards each year and because last week she showed me her own vampire short story in progress, she came up with the most fantastic idea. Print and Bind our little stories and then give them to each other as presents! Which is kind of ironic in a way (although I’m always being corrected on the use of that word) as last year when I was away on holiday my boyfriend printed and bound my own little novel (a draft version so it wasn’t perfect) in a lovely purple paper cover. It was very sweet even though it wasn’t perfect. So I might get him to do it again for me hehehehe.

Oh what a busy term this is turning out to be, writing, playing WOW on awesome new PC quite regularly thank god I was beginning to loose £8.99 a month for nothing, being a busy Librarian bumblebee and now getting creative again. I might even take the first step in redesigning the back of my white work jacket with the Norse Raven idea I’ve been developing. All works of further creativity will be displayed here. You just have to give me a bit of time to get started.

I’ve been asked on a number of occassion from various peoples around the globe about .NET Building Blocks for Blackboard. I’ve also considered starting a blog series for how to do things. I had the stimulus to finally start this blog process via another received request this week, so here goes.

There is a common feel with my development posts – I’m starting out very, very simple. I always like to get something working to build confidence. I’ve also gone through more than my fair share of How-To articles on the web, only to find it not to work in the later stages.

Common ground – Visual Studio 2008, Blackboard Version 8. (Although I have previously developed in VS 2005, targetting Blackboard 7.1+ (up to and including 9.0), and these instructions should work for these platforms as well – Let me know if you encounter issues).

1. Start Visual Studio, and select File->New Web Site.

2. From the popup, select ASP.NET Web Site and enter an appropriate location.

3. When the website loads, enter Hello World into the space in the div tags.

4. In the Solution Explorer View, right click on the website and select New Folder. Call this new folder ‘WEB-INF’.

5. Right click the WEB-INF folder and select ‘Add New Item…’. From the list select XML File, and enter the filename as ‘bb-manifest.xml’.

6. Replace the contents of the bb-manifest.xml with:

<?xml version=”1.0″ encoding=”iso-8859-1″ ?>
<manifest>
<!–core extension information–>
<plugin>
<name value=”Hello World”/>
<handle value=”GB-HelloWorld”/>
<description value=”Hello World .NET Building Block written by Greg Bowie.”/>
<version value=”0.0.1″/>
<requires>
<bbversion value=”7.0.0″/>
</requires>
<vendor>
<id value=”GB”/>
<name value=”Greg Bowie”/>
<url value=”http://gregorbowie.wordpress.com”/>
<description value=”Greg Bowie”/>
</vendor>

<webapp-type value=”Net”/>
<module-defs>
<module-type ext-ref=”hiworld” title=”Hello World” uicreatable=”false” isadmin=”true”>
<web-dir></web-dir>
<web>
<view>Default.aspx</view>
</web>
</module-type>
<module type=”hiworld” useraddable=”true” isdeletable=”false” isdetachable=”false” title=”Hello World”>
<description>Hello World .NET Building Block written by Greg Bowie (CIS, LJMU)</description>
<ExtraInfo/>
<module-groups>
<module-group id=”Everyone”/>
</module-groups>
</module>
</module-defs>
<permissions>
</permissions>
</plugin>
</manifest>

(For an excellent introduction to each of the entries in the XML file, please refer to Malcolm Murray’s Getting Started with Java Building Blocks blog entries).

7. Now we’re ready to publish the website. Go to the ‘Build’ menu and select ‘Publish Web Site’. Enter a file location for the publish location (I normally use the same directory name as my sourcecode, but append Pub on the end, e.g. E:\SourceCode\Blackboard\HelloWorld would be set to E:\SourceCode\Blackboard\HelloWorldPub). And then click Publish to publish the website.

8. Browse to the location of the publish directory. Within this directory, select all the files and zipped them up.

This zip file is now ready for installation to Blackboard. So log into Blackboard, click System Admin, click Building Blocks and then ‘Install Building Block’. Browse to the zip file and then follow on screen instructions.

Once your building block is listed, make it ‘available’. Then go to System Admin tab, Modules and locate the Hello World module. Hopefully you’ll get the words simpliest building block appear and say ‘Hello world’!

In conclusion, nothing terribly exciting at this stage, but that wasn’t what we set out to do. We’ve now got a .NET building block deployed into Blackboard.

I’m not certain of the best way forward from this point, so unless somebody has some specific queries, I think I’ll just look into interacting with the Blackboard APIs, probably just to present information about the current user. I’m open to suggestions though, and more than happy to help resolve queries…

Everything for the bodywork came from either Halfords or B&Q. Total spend was around £70. The rust was stripped back with an orbital sander – back to bare metal in some places, and the dent was attacked with a rubber mallet and then some filler. The heavy area of rust were then primed.

Next step was to hammerite the whole thing – matt black.
First time ’round a paint brush was used and put it on pretty thick – as a base coat. Big mistake! Hammerite is heavy and runs very easily, but sets as hard as metal. So the result was having to spend nearly two days stripping the whole thing back with an orbital and then applying a new coat – this time using a radiator roller. Much better, should have done that the first time. The top coat was genius: matt black
blackboard paint. £12 for a big tin (of which only used half was used),
with 4 thin coats applied in the end to get a smooth finish.

The bumpers were initially sprayed with halford Bumper paint, which went on well but a can didn’t stretch very far. So the roller came out again and both bumpers were covered in Hammerite. As would look crap as soon as it rained, it was experimented on with a good coat of clear turtlewax all over. Half an hour to do, and it did the trick. Better still, whilst it stopped the rain from streaking, it still allowed the surface to work as a massive blackboard.

The look was finished off by painting the steel wheels in black Hammerite and adding a set of gunmetal wheel trims from Halfords for £20. It really worked!

Friday, USF IT announced that Blackboard will be undergoing a facelift. This will not be the standard update. Blackboard will be updated to BB9. The creators have really tried to implement many web 2.0 features such as Drag and Drop info boxes (similar to your Facebook page), less clicking, and a somewhat redesigned grade center. The creators of blackboard have teamed up with NBC/Universal

Studios, to give professors and students access to the NBC News archive (Hundreds of news video footage from local and national NBC stations and affiliates, grouped by subject.) December 18th the new version of Blackboard will roll out, but if you want to see what it looks like now you can visit: http://bbpreview.acomp.usf.edu/

Tutorials for the new blackboard will becoming over the winter break.

I’m posting this for two reasons:

1. It’s an inspired use of a knackered looking fuse box.
2. It’s advertising a Staff Creative exhibition at The Sandcastle Organic Restaurant South Terrace. Work is by the staff and crew, might be interesting, might not.

Blackboard Fuse Box

Well first off I’m feeling up and down due to arguments with partner – we never seem to agree to disagree and I’m usually potrayed as egotisticle, selfish, self centered, childish, disrespectful, unreasonable liar. SO the less said on this matter the better really.

I say Vikings and Vampires as that is what us Librarians are turning into tomorrow for Children in Need. I’m going to be a viking maiden and my boss Terry is going to be a Vampire Cocktail Waitress hehehe. We’re going to make a right pair but it’s going to be so much fun to be in cloak and medieval gown again.

Library changes because I’m flinging myself fully into my Librarian role now as I have been making lots of small improvements in the Library that will hopefully help students and make it more appealing to the few that don’t regularly come in. I’ve introduced us to Twitter @HuddnewcollLib, begun setting us up a Facebook page of our own, regularly announcing any new books added to catalogue, introduced a reccomended list thats distributed around the Library and on Blackboard for students to access when online. Also began putting up ‘Brand New’ signs on new books on shelves and ‘New Edition’ on new Journals/Magazines in the hope of promoting them better to students. Still trying to get them to use the Library blog as so far only I have put any content in it hehehe but hopefully we’ll have someone taking the first step.

Also even better than all of this is my new PC! Due to arrive any minute today. I’m so excited about it. Not only does it have massive memory but also a good graphics card so it will have no problem stored all my pictures (3000 odd) and the massive WOW file plus WOW play will be super smooth and lag free. Can’t wait for the end of the day to fiddle with it.

In my writing life I’ve dropped my ghost story ‘As Old As Houses’  for a while as I feel I might actually re-write it too much. Although having said that my former creative writing tutor Michael Stewart has given my 5th draft the once over and says its a lot better and stronger since the first draft. So at least I’m doing something right.

I just need this rising temperature I feel to go down. I don’t want it to turn into Swine Flu not before my big dress up day anyway.

"You! Bring me the Wall Street Journal!"

Tuesday via FreePress.net  I found an article in The Chronicle of Higher Education.

The article talks about the Columbia Missourian, a newspaper (now online at www.columbiamissourian.com),  that the School of Journalism at the University of Missouri (est. 1908) has been publishing till this day.

This School of Journalism was the first in the United States.

The newspaper, once known as the University Missourian, is run by students. They don’t get paid and they don’t get benefits. They get school credit and experience that can land them jobs in the real world.

I thought about our School of Journalism, and of the different publications at Stony Brook; it makes me proud to be a student here.

Yes, The Stony Brook Press (also online at www.sbpress.com),  may be a little too liberal at times, and The Statesman (online at www.sbstatesman.com) may be a little boring, but it is ignorant to not pick up these papers and read them.

I hear people on campus complain that they are out of touch with what’s happening around them and shrugging at the lack of “school spirit”.

Not an excuse! We have Blackboard updates!!!

There are online publications like Stony Brook Independent (www.sbindependent.org), and

The Roads Scholar (for all the commuters out there, at  roads.shtml).

So check these papers out! There’s a reason why we have them. Want to keep journalism alive? Start small. Read the school paper, and if you’re in high school, read that one!

And read the Chronicle article, University-Based Reporting Could Keep Journalism Alive

The potential: “Daddy, Miss America wont share her toys.”

Obama vision could be crippled

by rich, greedy US institutions

… and commercial interests who want an arm  and two legs.

1. Sharing knowledge – The Gronstedt Group begins tour  of the SLENZ birthing unit.

The more time I spend in Second Life and  other virtual worlds the more I become convinced  that  SLENZ  joint leader Dr Clare Atkins (SL: Arwenna Stardust) is right: Collaboration and sharing is the key to success in  world education in virtual worlds.

But its not just collaboration within the United States, or New Zealand. It’s collaboration around the world.

The rich, big universities of North America and Europe might be able to afford to go  it alone, but for the smaller and the often poorer tertiary institutions of  the United States,  countries like  New Zealand, and Third World countries – if they even have reliable, affordable Broadband services – don’t have the luxury of NOT collaborating and sharing,  both at an institutional level and at an academic level.

The creation of complex builds, huds, animations and all the other paraphernalia of teaching successfully in a virtual  world, as well as aquiring the skills/knowhow to use them  can cost megabucks: to not share them under OpenSource and Creative Commons license with institutions and academics around the world would seem to be me to be both profligate and selfish. It also could regarded by some , particularly when sold at a high price or with an exorbitant  license fee attached, as both  neo-colonialist and  greedy capitalism of the kind that brought about the most recent crash of world markets.

Second Life behind the firewall

The collaboration thoughts, although first ennunciated  for me by  Dr  Atkins, were brought to mind more recently by  five things: the move by the Lindens, admitted an avowedly commercial organisation,  to  promote Second Life behind the firewall, previously Nebraska, to  commercial, Government and educational institutions at US$55,000 a pop, a princely sum for many cash-strapped institutions around the world;  President Obama’s Cairo vision, proclaimed in June;  a visit by the KiwiEd group to the University of Western Australia, Second  Life site; a Train for Success Gronstedt Group  35-avatar tour of the SLENZ Project’s virtual birthing unit on the Second Life island of Kowhai; and  finally, but not least,  the one-hour keynote address on copyright  by  Harvard University  Professor of Law Lawrence Lessig to  EDUCAUSE09 in Denver earlier this month.

2. Sharing the knowledge: Lessig’s certificate of entitlement.

Obama told  the world,  “We will match promising Muslim students with internships in America and create a new online network … ” something  which  Second Life arguably has been  doing for sometime with  the collaboration already  occurring between individual academics and many smaller institutions creating an “online network, facilitating collaboration across geographic and cultural boundaries.”

The problem with his vision is that  US commercial – and often Government -  interests  have almost always  worked against  facilitating collaboration and sharing across geographic  and cultural boundaries. Look at Microsoft software. Look at Apple and ITunes licensing. Look at software regionalisation. Look at the record industry. Look at the book industry, where rich English language publishers in the UK and the US split the world into at least two markets.  Look at the way copyright law has moved into  education – and science.

But its not a new phenomenon. Look at banana republics, created out of Boston,  as a rather ironical and destructive facilitation of collaboration across geographic and cultural boundaries.

Triumphs of reason

On the other hand there are triumphs of reason over idiocy. Look at the rise of the ubiquitous PC, compared to the Apple computer, even though using a proprietary Operating System  the rise from the “underground” of  Moodle, compared to say Blackboard; the slow advance of bilateral free trade agreements, even if not the much desired mutilateral  free trade agreements, instead of the trade siege mentality,  which  affected most of the world in the 1930s (and still threatens); the growing popularity of Linux compared to proprietary Operating Systems; and finally the astounding growth of  Wikipedia compared to Encarta or Britannia.

Despite my misgivings I have been heartened over the years by the surprising degree of co-operation and collaboration that has been happening in virtual worlds. That is despite the actions of  those  few Scrooge McDuck-like educational institutions which have purely commercial interests at heart and appear to run closed shop operations, sharing with none.

I was even more cheered recently by a visit to the University of Western Australia when I found that  university, which is in the forefront  of Australian virtual world education, was entering into bi-lateral  virtual “free trade” and/or “free exchange”  agreements with  the likes of Stanford University and others. This mirrors the agreements put in place  by  Scott Diener (SL: Professor Noarlunga) at the University of Auckland with the University of Boise; and Judy Cockeram (SL: Judy-Arx Scribe) and  her work with architects around the world;  and those “handshake”   agreements  or informal sharing arrangements put in place by a myriad of other relatively smaller institutions who have already recognised the benefits of world-wide collaboration.

3.Sharing the knowledge – KiwiEd group tours University of Wester Australia site.

And then there is the SLENZ Project, which 18 months ago adopted as its ruling credo,  complete transparency, with OpenSource under Creative Commons license for all its virtual educational products, developments and knowledge in the hope that others would be able to build on the team’s work. Even though the adoption of this credo was probably due more to the persistence and bloody-mindedness of a then non-Second Life “immersed” and relatively sceptical SLENZ Learning Designer Leigh Blackall than anything else, it has worked and is working.

One has to  agree now that Blackall was right, even though  there is obviously a place for fair payment to commercial (virtual world creators, builders, developers etc) interests, something Linden Labs has recognised  with its protection of its own virtual world product lines (and  unfortunately those created and developed by its residents, even if Creative Commons, full permissions and OpenSource) behind  the walls of Second Life.

Linden Labs is not alone, however, in usurping user/creator rights.  The way  they have covered the issue in their rather draconian and very American Terms of Service is little different from other major US on-line social networking services: if you put it up on their service, they own it.

Virtual World Free Trade/Exchange Pact?

This is despite, or perhaps in spite of “renegades” like the  onetime Arcadia Asylum, making all her magnificent “builds” available to “anyone to use anywhere,  how they like, even blowing it up.”

Like  the tyrants behind the old Iron Curtain the Lindens realise that keeping  control of their residents’ creations inside  their world (and keeping them there), guarantees that they will have to stay there unless they want to pour their creativity, time and work down the drain and start a new virtual life elsewhere.

This leads  me to the thought that President Obama, although paying lip service to “collaboration across geographic and cultural boundaries,” needs to put his Government’s money  where his mouth is and promote a world-wide free trade/exchange agreement for  virtual world education if not for virtual worlds themselves, guaranteeing rights of both personal ownership of  individual products when created or bought in a real world sense,  but also opening up US educational institution virtual knowledge and creativity for the rest of the world to freely add to, and build on.

The President  has the vision  for a better on-line world – which could lead to greater understanding between peoples through education.

If he does nothing except talk. Nothing will happen.

And, I believe, we will find the major educational institutions moving more behind their Ivy Walls – if they are not already there – and American educational institutions (and others in UK, Germany, Brazil etc) adopting  a siege mentality   even though  virtual worlds (all virtual worlds, whether emanating out of the US or China or anywhere else) will only fulfill their true potential of levelling the playing field for all educationally if they are free and open to all.

That is something America can do for the world – all worlds.

]]> http://openjlife.wordpress.com/2009/11/16/blackboard-academic-suite-cookietracking/ Mon, 16 Nov 2009 17:10:21 +0000 Jose Manuel http://openjlife.wordpress.com/2009/11/16/blackboard-academic-suite-cookietracking/

Por default el componente que funciona como servidor Web de Blackboard Academic Suite v.7.3, Apache, en su versión 1.3, no contiene el módulo UserTrack requerido para habilitar la opción CookieTracking, por lo tanto, se tendrá que descargar el código fuente del mismo y crear un módulo compartido de la siguiente manera:

1. Modificar script $BBHOME/apps/httpd/bin/apxs (apache extension tool) para utilizar la versión actual de perl y el compilador C (gcc):

!/usr/bin/perl
/usr/sfw/bin/gcc

2. Crear la librería compartida (dynamic shared object) del modulo “mod_usertrack”:

$ apxs -i -a -c mod_usertrack.c
/usr/sfw/bin/gcc -DSOLARIS2=290 -DMOD_SSL=208128 -DEAPI -KPIC -DSHARED_CORE -DSHARED_MODULE -I/usr/local/blackboard/apps/httpd/include  -c mod_usertrack.c
gcc: unrecognized option `-KPIC’
ld -G -o mod_usertrack.so mod_usertrack.o
[activating module `usertrack' in /httpd.conf]
cp mod_usertrack.so mod_usertrack.so
chmod 755 mod_usertrack.so
cp httpd.confhttpd.conf.bak
cp httpd.conf.new httpd.conf
rm httpd.conf.new
3. Agregar a los archivos httpd.conf y httpd.conf.bb en $BBHOME/apps/httpd/conf/ las líneas:

LoadModule usertrack_module libexec/mod_usertrack.so
CookieTracking on
CookieName session_id

4. Reiniciar Servicios Web

5. Verificar el procedimiento en el log $BBHOME/logs/httpd/access_log

<ip> – - [14/Nov/2009:00:38:25 -0600] “GET /images/ci/misc/tab_0r.gif HTTP/1.1″ 200 121 0 “Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686; en-US; rv:1.9.1.5) Gecko/20091109 Ubuntu/9.10 (karmic) Firefox/3.5.5″ “__utma=82810845.1676436438.1257465576.1258047121.1258180051.5; __utmz=82810845.1257465576.1.1.utmcsr=(direct)|utmccn=(direct)|utmcmd=(none); session_id=36F4234152D7EFE5828F33988F192FC4; JSESSIONID=0A81047DB9F95F5B5F0AA454B25F3B13.root; __utmb=82810845.2.10.1258180051; __utmc=82810845″

This report, prepared by Sage Road Solutions for the E-Learning Guild, describes the current status and future direction of Learning Management System (LMS) use in e-Learning. 

The product lifecycle diagram shown suggests that LMSs, as we have known them until today, will likely start to fade from the learning ecosystem scene by 2012. Evidence suggests that over the next five years LMSs will look more like portals and less like platforms. They will feature Web 2.0 collaborative tools, including connected modular functionality, which organisations will select as being most rele­vant for the management needs of the learning organisation doing the purchasing. 

Top Ten Trends   

1. Home Grown LMSs are on the decline - can’t keep up with the needs for integration and additional features (although home grown often liked more and better designed for the job required) .
2. Moodle moves to the front of the LMS adoption pack – Moodle (24%) moves ahead of Blackboard (17.5%), the global financial crises may have had a lot to do with this.
3. Hosted options for LMSs are achieving popularity – Whether described as SAAS, ASP, a Hosted Service (which combines an application service provider and an Internet service provider), or as Cloud Computing, many LMS providers have listened to their small and medium customers and are now offering hosted LMS solutions.   
4. Open source, open applications and open education resources are on the rise - This is more prevalent for the education sector. Examples of open source LMS systems include Moodle, Sakai™, and soon, the full-identity management, multi-institution, and multi-million dollar project, Kuali Student. The variables that make open source attractive in education are increasingly relevant in the commercial market. These include cost-of-ownership, flexibility for meeting unique enterprise needs, and maintenance on terms favoring the customers.  
5. Blackboard gains corporate LMS market share – It is believed that this is due to the acquisition of Angel which firmly entrenched them in the enterpirse market, prior to this they were mainly academic.  
6. Commercial LMS customers: less formal more holistic - they are moving away from just using their LMS for compliance needs to all other areas of training.   
7. Extensibility matters – Openness, also known as extensibility, is fundamental to enterprise software in that it “talks” to other enterprise systems present in customers’ computing environments. For example, Blackboard connects to Facebook and other social networking applications, has an active developer’s network, building blocks, and a commitment to interactivity and integration, all done in a supported way. 
8. Campuses and businesses alike are slow to adopt “Enterprise 2.0″ - Quick to embrace the LMS, with over 97% adoption in the past 8 years, these institutions are now re-evaluating the systems chosen during the web 1.0 era in order to deal with 2.0 opportunities and requirements. Nearly 25% of them report a high likelihood of migrating to open source LMS systems for some applications or needs, but are unsure of their choices.   
9. The recession continues to constrain – small LMS providers are losing their hold in the market. Lots of acquisitions – Blackboard purchased WebCT and Angel, Oracle acquired PeopleSoft, SumTotal took over PathLore, and Saba acquire both Thinq and Centra. Two companies are also bidding for SumTotal.  
10. Revising standards, specifications and structures – SCORM is the biggest one here. SCORM is still under the auspices of the U.S. Department of Defense, there is talks that LETSI  will take it over. At the same time, the newly energised IMS Consortium announced their development of a SCORM alternative called the Common Cartridge.   A copy of the full report is available. 

Our first full week back at work after Officers’ Councils and holiday involved a lot of catching up and, because Christmas is a busy time in the Salvation Army, quite a lot of planning ahead. The photo is the luncheon club which we enjoy at the hall three days a week. The week finished on the Saturday with some Safe and Sound (child protection) training in Nottingham.

Do you need to know how to reference a book, journal article, thesis, CD-Rom etc ?

There is a section in your Blackboard Information Skills course accessible via the Student Portal that gives you detailed instructions and examples of how to reference different types of material for your coursework.

Dave Hirst
Faculty Team Librarian

By chance, I’ve looked at three stories today about the future of VLEs which are relevant to this University’s use of Blackboard.

The first was an article by Lisa M. Lane in First Monday, titled Insideous pedagogy:  how course management systems impact teaching. It argues that the educational assumptions implicit in the design of systems such as Blackboard and Moodle affect the pedagogic choices made by tutors new to teaching online. For example, Blackboard’s default ‘Course Resources’ content area encourages tutors to use it as a document store. Tutors can of course use the Control Panel to configure Blackboard to their own needs, for example by creating a content area for each course topic, but may lack the awareness that it is possible or the knowledge of how to do it. I see the answer as a partnership between academic staff and learning technologists such as myself, where I find out what they want to achieve and then provide the advice and support needed.

The second was a discussion at this year’s Educause conference about the relative merits of commerical VLE systems, such as Blackboard, compared with open-source solutions, such as Moodle and Sakai. The open-source speakers stressed the advantages of a wide user community, lack of licence restrictions, freedom to innovate and the decoupling of paid-for support from the licence provider. The commercial speaker seemed much more defensive and said that Blackboard were improving their customer support and learning lessons from the open-source community. It was interesting that a US University that switched to Moodle made a deliberate decision to maintain their VLE budget and spent the money saved on the licence costs on a programmer and some instructional designers to help the academic staff make better use of the new system.

Finally, an email from ALT arrived advertising a panel discussion with the inflamatory title ‘The VLE is Undead!’. The future success of e-learning depends on appropriate selection of tools and
services.  This symposium will propose that the Virtual Learning Environment
(VLE) as an institutional tool is dead, no more, defunct, expired.

Originally delivered at ALTC 2009, this discussion has since moved forward,
opinions have changed, divided and developed so it could now be argued that
VLE’s are undead – an entity which was once alive, has since died but
continued to carry some life like characteristics.

This lively debate is designed to give end users a voice and an opportunity to
discuss the issues that arise by using institutional VLE’s.

The first panel member Steve Wheeler, will argue that many VLEs are not fit
for purpose, and masquerade as solutions for the management of online
learning.  Some are little more than glorified e-mail systems.  He will argue that
VLE’s provide a negative experience for learners.

The second panellist, Graham Attwell, believes that the VLE is dead and that
the Personal Learning Environment (PLE) is the solution to the needs of the
diverse learner.  PLE’s provide opportunities for learners, offering users the
ability to develop their won space in which to reflect on their learning.

The third panel member, James Clay, however believes that the VLE is not yet
dead as a concept, but can be the starting point of a journey for many
learners.  Creating an online environment involving multiple tools that provides
for an enhanced experience for learners can involve a VLE as a hub or centre.

The fourth panel member, Nick Sharratt, argues for the concept of the
institutional VLE as essentially sound.  VLE’s provide a stable, reliable, self-
contained and safe environment in which all teaching and learning activities
can be conducted.  It provides the best environemtn for the variety of
learners within institutions.

The session will be chaired by Josie Fraser.

Structure of the Session

The symposium will begin with an opportunity for attendees to voice their
opinions on the future of the VLE.  Each member of the panel will then present
their case.  The panel, with contributions from the audience will then debate
the key issues that have arisen.  There will also be pre-event online
discussions taking place via Twitter and blogs asking for the key issues that
affect users and the most popular will then be taken for discussion in breakout
sessions.  The panel will then re-convene for a closing discussion.

Intended Outcomes

By the end of the session, participants will be able to have a greater
understanding of the evolution and possible extinction of the VLE and its
impact on learners.

Booking Details

Places are available at the cost price of £40 per person which includes
refreshments and a light lunch.  To book your place, please visit the Learning
Lab website (www.learninglab.org.uk) or contact Abi Redmond, Event
Organiser on 01902 322362 for further details.

Technology Issue Notice: Blackboard proxy errors.

Issue Summary: Indications that Students and Faculty can log into Blackboard but are getting a proxy error when clicking on a course.

Update Date/Time: 11/08/2009 5:55 pm

Initial Discovery Date/Time: 11/08/2009 10:45 am

Resolution: Blackboard access has been restored as of 12:50 pm.

[X] This issue has been resolved